You have to love this amazing car, the Citroën P17 Autochenille (‘caterpillar’ or in this case ‘half-track’). It is exactly the sort of thing I would fully expect to see Tintin driving across the Sahara in, wearing an arab headress and with Capt. Haddock floundering around in the back!

The signage at the 24 Hour Museum at Le Mans, where I found it, says only 6 were made. The Citroën Originals site says 10 were built between 1921 – 1940. Either way, it’s certainly very rare.

It is based on the work of French engineer, Adolphe Kégresse, who was hired by Tsar Nicholas II in 1911 to convert some of his cars to half-tracks that he could use in the snow. The key feature with tracked vehicles is that the tracks spread the load. In this case Kégresse added continuous flexible belts for tracks, rather than heavy metal linked tracks, and stuck skis on the front wheels. After the Russian revolution he returned to France, where Citroën took up his designs.

The P17, with its 30 horsepower engine could tow up to 6 tons and had a maximum speed of 22 mph (36 kph).